Toecabulary is the comprehensive glossary of photography terminology and techniques. Every week, you get to learn a new term defined and depicted in stunning photographs and videos. Click here if you wish to refer to this Dictionary of Photography in its entirety, or, click here to read all our weekly Toecabulary posts that discuss various concepts of photography in great detail.
If you are constantly stirred by the myriads of colours and elements the world brims with, how much of it do you include and how much of it you let go when you make a photograph?
This week, Toecabulary brings you ‘composition’, a concept that talks about how best a photograph is made based on how elements are included or excluded in the frame. Composition is an immensely vast subject to discuss and so, we will discuss the vast array of guidelines over several weeks. Today, watch this space for photographs that demonstrate one of the several vital elements that constitute composition: Rule of Thirds.
This portrait of a young priest with the Ganga Aarti on the ghats of Varanasi is a classic example of a composition signifying the Rule of Thirds. The face of the boy has been placed on the top-left coordinate, leaving a good sense of space in the photograph.
Here is a rufous-tailed hummingbird hovering near a flower in the cloudforests of Costa Rica. While the hummingbird is placed on the top-left coordinate, the flower occupies the top-right coordinate to add an aesthetic balance to the image.
The Black Church in Iceland has been captured from various perspectives. But here is an image that captures both the Church on the top left coordinate but also the cross nearby, which occupies both the coordinates on the right side of the frame lending it a slightly daunting appearance as compared to the church itself.
While the Rule of Thirds enhances the aesthetics of your images, you can also add a stroke of surprise by defying it when you think you have an opportunity to make such an image.
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